Let me ask you to undertake an exercise in pure imagination.
Imagine an America in which a new King George can steal from the poor to give to the rich.
Imagine this new King George can attack another country that presents no imminent threat to us.
Imagine this new King George can listen to your phone conversations, go through your mail, read your email, arrest you, torture you, and jail you for life without the intervention of the courts.
Imagine this wasn’t England a few centuries ago. Or Stalin’s Russia. Or Pinochet’s Chile. Imagine this was America in the 21st century. The actual country you live in, that people call a democracy.
Imagine some blogger wrote that it’s time for you to wake up and smell the royalist takeover. Imagine this blogger claimed a royalist coup was taking place in the name of a so-called “war on terror.”
Imagine this “war on terror” was a total hype. Imagine it could not be called a war, because the terrorists didn’t have a country to have a war against. Imagine the terrorists were simply a bunch of bad guys – no more than 10,000 criminals – hunted by the world’s cops.
Imagine that the number of Americans killed by international terrorists since the 60s, including those killed on 9/11, was about the same as those zapped by lightning, or by accident-causing deer, or by allergic reactions to peanuts.
Imagine a certain John Mueller wrote: "In almost all years, the total number of people worldwide who die at the hands of international terrorists is not much more than the number who drown in bathtubs in the United States.”
Imagine that this scattered, limited phenomenon was hyped by the new King George into a huge and scary thing.
Imagine that when the US was threatened by something far worse than a few thousand terrorists — to wit, countlesss nuclear warheads aimed at our cities — our leaders never felt they needed the right to lock up people on their say-so alone, or the right to put prisoners beyond the reach of our courts with the legal trick of calling them “enemy combatants.”
Imagine our country occupied another country, and some of the people in that country kept on fighting against us, because they wanted us out of their country. If foreigners occupied America – wouldn’t you want to fight against them?
Well now, imagine there WERE people occupying your country. Imagine they called themselves Americans, but there was this blogger who called them royalists. Heck, he said he sometimes felt like calling them “enemy combatants.” Imagine they had actual names like George Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Alberto Gonzales, as well as a few other names not fit for children’s ears.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Dave Nalle
I'm ready for it. Of course it's not going to work out quite the way you hope, because those who support the president are far more likely to be armed and ready to rebel than those who don't. But that's okay, because they want revolution too, and they are better armed and more numerous. But of course, the BEST armed and most likely to revolt are those who despise the president and absolutely loathe the American left. So as was the case in the original revolution those extreme reactionaries would likely be the vanguard and it would be their agenda which came to dominate in the new republic.
So we'd have a revolution. The Constitution would be cut back to the first 15 amendments. The federal government would be virtually dissolved. The national military would be reduced to a simple Department of War which would coordinate the efforts of the state militias. Concealed carry would be legal without permit in every state as would the ownership of fully automatic weapons. These new amendments would be added to the Constitution:
An amendment declaring the end to any federal role in determining the legality of abortion, leaving it entirely up to the individual states.
An amendment guaranteeing the right of states and institutions to recognize and acknowledge a Christian god.
An amendment guaranteeing the right to school choice and unorganized personal prayer in school.
An amendment requiring the federal government to divest itself of all land and mineral rights through private auction.
An amendment prohibiting all foreign humanitarian aid and membership in or acknowledgement of the authority of any international governmental or juridical body within the borders of the united states.
An amendment requiring the forced repatriation of all illegal immigrants and financial compensation from their home governments for any past services rendered to them. Plus closing and fortifying the borders.
An amendment prohibiting any kind of racial or other quotas in hiring or the assigning of contracts.
An amendment prohibiting gay marriage.
Some of this would be good, some of it would be less appealing, but in a nutshell this is the agenda which would come to dominate if we actually had a revolution - so be careful what you wish for.
Dave
2 - Maurice
We live in a representative republic - not a democracy.
Bush is done in 3 years. You have nothing to fear but another election.
3 - Maurice
Dave
I would think we would also have term limits and something to force the elected leaders to be subject to whatever laws they wrote.
4 - RedTard
Imagine we had a chance to vote on this new king and the people reelected him. Your in the leftwing nutjob minority. Get over yourself.
Almost every single statement you made from the outset is a complete and utter lie. It's a good thing you used the words 'imagine if', that is the only way someone could experience the world that only exists in your mind.
5 - troll
Dave - you left out the one about a ban on the use of federal funds for public education
troll
6 - troll
Adam - care to fill in the blanks (speculate) about how US citizens might go about this 'throwing off' process - ?
troll
7 - Bing
You had an extra glass of Kool Aid with breakfast this morning didn't you Adam?
If you keep drinking so much what will all th e other left wing nutcases drink?
8 - Adam Drake
Adam:
Great article. There are many right-wingers who will try to defend or dilute the facts you stated but in the end the truth can only be supressed for so long.
I am anxiously awaiting the revolution in this country, though I don't believe it will be of the armed conflict type. I think that eventually the government will become so overbearing that the pendulum of American politics will swing the other way as it does every so often.
As for me personally, I have been planning on emigrating to Switzerland for the last few years. The principles of this country are worth fighting for, but few people in government these days place any value on those principles (limited government, right to privacy, etc.)
I can't wait for the revolution.
9 - Natalie Davis
I am all for nonviolent revolution, though I know any such occurence will involve arms. Then again, I am convinced that any hope of a decent US is doomed. Sure, I will do my duty to try to help an honest, just America to emerge, but it does not escape me that the effort is destined to faill. Still, people with integrity will do what is right whether or not there is hope of success.
10 - Bing
Dilute what facts Mr. Drake?
The fact that you liberals keep implying that this administration has conducted rampant and random wiretaps on innocent American citizens and that Bush is hitler like?
Where is the proof of these so called facts? Give me the names of a few innocent Americans who have had thier telephone conversations wiretapped. please provide information regarding these cases.
Give me the names of innocent American citizens who have had thier civili liberties infringed upon because of actions taken by this administration. Tell us all about these cases. Dates, locations, who was involved, what exactly happened.
Hitler used his military to attack numerous nations in Europe and occupied them. Bush has been in office for 6 years and has he attacked numerous nations and sought to occupy them? Hitler sought to commit genocide aginst the Jewish people. Has Bush said or done anything that could lead one to believe that he desires to commit genocide against an entire group of people based on race, ethnicity, or religion? How is Bush like hitler?
You guys come on here day after day screaming about how our rights are being taken away and how we are living in a police state but you never offer any examples. I'm asking that you please do this. If you can't I suggest you shut the fuck up.
11 - RedTard
Bing, we are occupying Iraq and Afghanistan at this moment. Resolutions 1483 and 1511 from the UN recognize and reinforce our status as occupying power.
12 - adam
Bing #10:
Who said Bush is like Hitler? You say people say so, but it's only in your own mind. I said Bush was like King George, for chrissake -- can't you read? Bush is no way like Hitler at all in any way whatsoever, starting with this big difference: Hitler was elected by a majority.
As for names of innocents who've been tortured, we know it happened to a Canadian who was sent to the Middle East by us and tortured there, to a German who was extraordinarily renditioned, and that an Italian was kidnapped in Italy by CIA guys whom the Italians want to prosecute.
Why don't you ask these guys if they don't feel their rights were taken away?
Then there's one American who was held for terrorism as an "enemy combatant" and now they're trying to bring him up at long last -- on far lesser accusations than the ones they originally arrested him for.
These examples have been offered freely in the national press. So again I have to ask -- can't you read?
Are there any innocent Americans being held against their will? Well, the scary thing is, how can we know we'd know?
Adam.
13 - HazeMac
Liberals. Conservatives. Pro. Con. The parties dictate what goes on in this country. The parties are supported by businesses. Businesses have interests to uphold and develop, money to make; they have a responsibility to their shareholders. Shareholders own shares to make money. Shareholders, along with their respective businesses, dictate what the parties do. I would love to see a country that is run by individual thoughts - by intelligent, informed individual decisions, uninfluenced by a larger economic cloud - but I don't believe that is a reality. That is an ideology, a daydream, not a possibility. Remember two things: the Roman Empire, and that a candle that burns twice as bright, burns half as long.
14 - zingzing
okay right-wing fucknuts--obviously, adam was overstating, putting things in a terrible light. even in the days of the real king george, some people supported him (although they wouldn't admit it a few years later). adam was viewing things from an angle, and not a flattering angle. everything he said is based in the truth, even if it is just the form of his choosing. that's the beauty of it all: this wasn't a "news" item, it was an opinion piece--although it's more of a satire really. like "brazil" is a satire, a fiction, a possible future, not unbelievable. you view things from your own angle, and your version is as warped as this is. you have no more of a claim to the "truth" than he does, and while adam's "truth" makes me laugh, it's a nervous laugh... while your's just makes me giggle.
15 - adam
Thank you, zingzing. Well zung.
Adam
16 - JELIEL³
Damn do the right-wingers come out and play when their divinely inspired leader is criticized.
Nice piece Adam. And I've been asking myself these very questions ever since JUNIOR (or King George) started crapping on the constitution with his USA Patriot Act.
Being Canadian I have a less patriotically blurred view of his presidency and he scares the crap out of me. But what scares me more is the amount of support he gets and the lack of protest he gets. All he has to say to gain points in polls is state that he just averted a terrible terrorist attack in somewhere-America and he's back in good with the crowd.
17 - Ted
Imagine if all the past Presidents ignored terroist threats.
18 - adam
Ted #17: Hey, this President ignores terrorist threats himself. Osama is still free, Bush attacked Iraq instead (who didn't attack us), and look how prepared he was for disaster when Katrina struck.
Adam Ash.
19 - Dave Nalle
Adam Drake: you might want to research emigration to Switzerland sometime. Unless one of your parents is Swiss by birth you basically can't become a citizen there. Plus it's the most heavily armed society in the world - doesn't that scare you ooooooh guns, boogey boogey!
Dave
20 - tommyd
I pray and wait for American Revolution II. It must happen, it will happen, and it's going to happen. The corrupt, kleptocratic, corporate-ruled, oligarchic, tyrannical, fascist-zionist politicians that firmly control United States, Incorporated are frantically trying to keep a lid on the pressure cooker they've created. They use their media and their police to keep the masses afraid, subdued, and docile. However, their plan to enslave the people is doomed and the people will once again have the power to decide their own destiny again, as proscribed in the US Declaration of Independence.
"The tree of liberty must be watered with the blood of tyrants and patriots alike from time to time." Thomas Jefferson
President Jefferson, I think the tree is badly withered, but not completely dead, so we'll water her for you and keep the dream alive!
21 - RedTard
As a person with much experience with guns and a past explosives expert I can tell you that taking down the right wing will not be as easy as you think. We always were better shots. (Cheney excepted of course)
22 - JR
The Left has better biologists. How good is your aim when you're vomitting out your vital organs?
23 - Justin Berry
I see adam saved a little Kool-Aid for Tommyd.
An armed revolution definately does not bode well for the left. The NRA is definately pro Bush.
24 - zingzing
hey dave, guns don't go "boogey boogey," they go "boo-ya, blam!"
25 - troll
zingzing - when the bullet's got your name on it you won't hear anything....arrrgghh
troll
ps nothing personal